City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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COLLEGEVILLE — As good as Spring-Ford’s basketball standouts are, it was one of their football players that was holding them all together. Then Matt Zollers hurt his foot earlier in the month, in a win over Pope John Paul II, and the Rams had to figure it all out all over again.

“Matt Zollers means so much to us [...] he makes us tougher, can shoot the ball, can handle a little bit, he’s just a winner,” Spring-Ford head coach Joe Dempsey said of the junior wing, a high-major quarterback recruit. “We’re kind of reinventing ourselves, and it’s really hard to do three quarters through a high school season.”

With Zollers on the sideline in a boot, Spring-Ford still won five of its next six games, but a 22-point loss at the hands of Methacton meant that Thursday’s night season finale with rival Perkiomen Valley was not only its last chance to get some momentum going into the playoffs, but was also for the outright Pioneer Athletic Conference Liberty Division championship.

With one football player out, another one stepped up. 

Junior Jordan Marsilio, a deeper reserve to begin the year, has become Spring-Ford’s top reserve, playing more minutes his last two weeks than ever before. He saved his best effort for the final game of the regular season as Spring-Ford outlasted Perkiomen Valley, 50-41, to capture the Liberty crown.

Marsilio, a muscular 6-foot-2 junior guard who stars as a wide receiver on the gridiron, scored a season-high 11 points in the Rams’ win, seven of those coming in the fourth quarter. He’s not the playmaker Zollers is with the ball in his hands, but he’s got every ounce of toughness, grabbing four of his six rebounds on the offensive end, throwing his body around with abandon in a physical affair.

“It’s that football mindset,” he said. “We need a guy with toughness out there who’s willing to go get offensive rebounds and steals and go get tough out there.”

In a game that was a two-point contest going into the fourth quarter, Perk Valley holding its guests to a single point in the third, Marsilio came up clutch down the stretch.

He was 5-of-6 from the foul line (7-8 for the game), making two with 3:25 left to put Spring-Ford (17-5, 9-1) up five points, and another pair with 42 seconds remaining to make it a 47-39 ballgame.

“That was my most foul shots in a game, ever,” he said. “In the beginning of the year I shot foul shots in one of the first games, and the coaches were like ‘I didn’t know you were a good foul shooter,’ and I was like, ‘yeah, I’ve always been a good foul shooter.’ Proved it tonight.”

Marsilio capped his night off with a touchdown pass of sorts, hauling in an inbounds pass from Tommy Kelly and laying it in with 10 seconds remaining.

“I told the guys, there’s a lesson in resilience,” Dempsey said. “He didn’t play much earlier in the year, was getting his football legs and now we go through stretches where we can’t take him off the floor, hitting foul shots — and obviously he’s a great wide receiver, you saw that last play, it was kind of a bonus.”

Marsilio isn’t the only one who’s stepped up in Zollers’ absence. Senior guard Jake Dellangelo, previously their top reserve, has moved into the starting lineup; he hit two 3-pointers to get to seven points on Thursday, adding three rebounds and three steals. Sophomore Blake Turner and junior Luke Pufko gave them minutes off the bench. 

“Those are the types of guys, I wouldn’t call them bench players or role players, we call them who they are,” senior guard E.J. Campbell said. “That’s Jake Dellangelo, that’s Jordan Marsilio.”

“Jordan Marsilio’s a great player, plays football, tough kid,” he added. “Wasn’t even going to play basketball this year but we all convinced him, and I’m glad it worked out. He just plays relentless, 

Campbell powered Spring-Ford with 18 points, coming up with 10 of those in the fourth quarter alone to set the stage for Marsilio’s foul shots. Campbell’s driving layup with 4:20 remaining put Spring-Ford up 34-32, breaking the game’s final tie; he nearly lost the ball on another layup attempt but gathered it back mid-air to put his team up 39-34 with 2:42 remaining. 

Campbell capped his night with a feed from Tommy Kelly for an open bucket, making it 41-34 with 2:05 to play. The Rams went 9-of-12 from the line in the closing two minutes to finish it off. 

That was enough to out-duel Perk Valley star senior Julian Sadler, who finished with 15 points as he as he faced a good deal of attention from the Spring-Ford defense, which threw a number of different looks at the talented left-hander. 

The Vikings (18-4, 7-3) got a strong night from senior forward Josh Tagert (14 points, 7 rebounds), while senior Kyle Shawaluk (8 points, five assists, five steals, three rebounds) didn’t have his best shooting night but made up for it with his playmaking and defense.

“Hats’ off to Perk Valley, Sadler’s a warrior and they didn’t quit, they’re tough, they really, really played great defense,” Dempsey said. 

The win kept Spring-Ford just ahead of Perk Valley and Methacton instead of tied with the two for the league title, playoff seeding left to tiebreakers. They’ll now have a week off before a PAC semifinal game next Friday at Perkiomen Valley.

“It feels great,” Campbell said. “That was one of my goals this year, just clinch the division, try to win the PAC chip, so that’s our next goal, just one game at a time. We’ve got a couple days off so just stay in the lab, stay locked in.”

By Quarter
Perk Valley:   8   |   9   |   8   |  16  ||  41
Spring-Ford: 17  |   9   |   1   |  23  ||  50

Shooting
Perk Valley: 14-39 FG (6-25 3PT), 7-14 FT
Spring-Ford: 15-37 FG (4-12 3PT), 16-22 FT

Scoring
Perk Valley: Julian Sadler 15, Josh Tagert 14, Kyle Shawaluk 8, Anthony Rodriguez 4

Spring-Ford: EJ Campbell 18, Jordan Marsilio 11, Tommy Kelly 9, Jake Dellangelo 7, Jacob Nguyen 5